Relations Between Self-Reported Adverse Events in Childhood and Hypersexuality in Adult Male Sexual Offenders

• NCJ Number: 252255
• Author(s): Drew A. Kingston, Franklyn J. Graham, Raymond A. Knight
• Date Published: April 2017
• Length: 14 pages
• Agencies: NIJ-Sponsored

Annotation

Since hypersexuality, or extreme normophilic sexual urges and behavior, has been found to be an important predictor of recidivism among sex offenders and continues to be discussed widely in the literature, the current study investigated the developmental roots of this construct in a sample of 529 adult male sexual offenders, who were administered the Multidimensional Assessment of Sex and Aggression.

Abstract

Physical, psychological, and sexual abuse experiences were estimated using several scales of early development. Psychological abuse in childhood and adolescence, especially by a father, was found to be the most prominent predictor of subsequent hypersexual thoughts and behaviors. The accumulation of abuse types, however, was also associated with a monotonic increase in the latent trait of hypersexuality. The consequences of these results for conceptualizations of the construct are discussed. (Publisher abstract modified)